Briefing: dynamic mode couplings of railway composite track slabs

Steel-concrete composite railway track slabs are a financial-viable alternative for the modular construction of railway slab tracks and for the replacement of resilient timber transoms on railway bridges. The design and experiment had been carried out to investigate the technical feasibility. In this study, the extended outcomes based on dynamic eigenvalue analyses of precast steel-concrete composite slab panel for track support structure are presented. Using ABAQUS finite element package, the natural frequencies of the railway composite slabs can be investigated. Dynamic eigenmodes are then extracted using Lancsoz method. Modal crossover phenomena can be clearly observed when changing the design mass of track slabs. This paper highlights the unprecedented dynamic mode coupling effects on the composite track slabs over a railway bridge in which the insight can improve practical noise and vibration control technologies through composite material design resulting in quieter railway track slabs.